During its first meeting since the Dec. 2 terror attack in San Bernardino in which 14 people were killed and 22 wounded, the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday unanimously approved several measures that will ramp up security at county facilities, seek state and federal funding assistance and extend paid leave for environmental health employees.

The meeting began with an emotional remembrance ceremony for the victims. Board Chairman James Ramos led a prayer.

“We pray for the families of those that are going through this tragic time. We ask now that the continuing of prayers continue to come in to San Bernardino County, and specifically to our (Environmental Health Services) department,” Ramos said.

Supervisors each took turns naming some of the slain victims until all their names were read. They also took time to speak on behalf of the victims’ families and the first responders. Then, all in attendance in the crowded board chambers observed a moment of silence in honor of the victims.

“Terror has arrived at our doorsteps, and we will and we can never be the same again,” Supervisor Robert Lovingood said.

Supervisor Josie Gonzales said the tragedy made her, and all those affected by it, grateful to be alive.

“We are blessed with the opportunity to embrace every moment from this day forward for as long as we have life,” Gonzales said. “And that we embrace the time we have left to bring about change — change in ourselves, the opportunity to promote change in others, and the opportunity for us to live with the knowledge that we now have a completely different purpose from what we once thought because of what happened on Dec. 2.”

The board approved five agenda items related to the mass shooting, including ratification of an emergency proclamation allowing the county to seek state and federal funding to recoup some of the costs associated with the attack and recovery efforts.

County CEO and Director of Emergency Services Greg Devereaux declared the emergency on Dec. 10, which allowed the county to hire a contractor and immediately begin security upgrades at county facilities including the county Government Center at 385 N. Arrowhead Ave., the old Hall of Records building at 172 W. Third St., the county office building at 8575 Haven Ave. in Rancho Cucamonga, and West Valley Superior Court at 8303 Haven Ave., also in Rancho Cucamonga.

Shortly after 11 a.m. on Dec. 2, county environmental health specialist Syed Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, clad in tactical gear, wearing ski masks and armed with assault rifles, burst into the Inland Regional Center and opened fire on about 70 people, most county employees, during a training event and holiday luncheon for environmental health services employees. The federal government declared the mass shooting an act of terrorism and the deadliest strike on U.S. soil since 9/11. In the shooting, 13 of the 14 people killed and 18 of the 22 wounded were county employees.

County spokesman David Wert stressed that there are no current threats to county facilities, and that the threat level is no higher now than it was on Dec. 1.

The security upgrades are a redoubling of the county’s ongoing efforts to continually re-examine employee and public safety at its facilities and make any necessary adjustments as the need arises. Those efforts, said Wert, have been underway since 9-11 and a mass shooting at Riverside City Hall in 1998 in which three council members and three police officers were wounded.

Other measures unanimously approved by the board Tuesday include extended paid leave for the county’s more than 100 environmental health employees through Jan. 12 and a temporary $27,729 employment contract with retired behavioral health director Allan Rawland. Rawland, who also formerly served as interim director for the county Department of Public Health, will help manage that department, which oversees Environmental Health Services, through Feb. 12.

“There’s a lot going on right now, and they felt there should be some extra administrative support all the way around,” county spokesman David Wert said.

After nearly two weeks of closure due to the shooting, the county’s environmental health services division reopened Monday at a new location — the county’s old Hall of Records building on Third Street, with temporary employees. The temporary staffing is composed of employees from other county departments who previously worked in environmental services, retired public health employees who agreed to return on a temporary basis, and 22 employees on loan from Riverside County, Wert said.

Joe Nelson is an award-winning investigative reporter who has worked for The Sun since November 1999. He started as a crime reporter and went on to cover a variety of beats including courts and the cities of Colton, Highland and Grand Terrace. He has covered San Bernardino County since 2009. Nelson is a graduate of California State University Fullerton. In 2014, he completed a fellowship at Loyola Law School's Journalist Law School program.

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